Chairman Carr Announces Six Months of Operation Clean Carts Success

Led by the Federal Communications Commission’s Council on National Security, the FCC launched Operation Clean Carts to rid e-commerce platforms of unauthorized covered equipment. Over the last six months, online marketplaces have collectively removed or blocked over 3 million product listings associated with insecure “covered” equipment. Since each listing can result in many sales, the actual number of devices removed from sale is likely significantly higher. Moreover, participating e-commerce platforms have voluntarily strengthened their compliance programs with automated detection, enhanced product vetting, rapid delisting mechanisms, third-party seller education, and ongoing improvements to internal compliance. The FCC has encouraged and witnessed the development of several practices that could benefit the entire e-commerce ecosystem, including: 

• Using AI and machine-learning tools to identify potentially unlawful devices through text, image, and metadata searches, even where third-party sellers use evasive tactics (such as misspelled or abbreviated brand names, image manipulation, or the purposeful misclassification of devices in unrelated categories to avoid detection).
• Verifying FCC authorization, including cross-checking FCC IDs against the equipment authorization system and collecting the needed information to ensure the device is FCC compliant.